Cutting the Middle Man

Dinner is over, right? If you’re eating…stop.

Obi is trying a new strategy for growing minions. Since he hasn’t had any luck getting a life-giving bolt of lightning, he has decided to try growing them inside. Inside him. He gave up a gigantic ball of hair this afternoon – if I hadn’t seen it come out of him I would have thought it was Oliver’s.

It was exhausting. He plunked down next to it to recover. And he was none to happy when I swooped in with a paper towel and took his hard work away.

This evening he is back to a previous strategy: using the people as incubators. Both Oliver and Obi are dedicated to sending The Boy and I out into the world with mini-minions. Little brown and orange striped hairs made it all the way to the Vatican this spring. But with today’s setback, Obi decided to cut the middle man with his hairification of our clothing.

The Boy walked in on him “napping” on the ironing board.

We’ll see how this works out.

Advertisement

Ten Four, Kitten Thunder

Yesterday was Oliver and Obi’s birthday. The grey kitten is now ten. The brown kitten is four. Sniff – my babies are growing up.

They had a can of salmon last night for their birthday dinner.

Blindsided

So I just realized something…

I built this cool “alter” to my bearded dragon in June…over the three bearded irises that I planted with Zensai when I buried him. I wonder if they’ll still grow if I move the pots. This irritates me because irises are my favorite flower and I have never been able to grow them. Ever. Now I’m just standing in my own way.

Zensai would be amused.

***

Since we’re doing updates from other posts, the missing fortune kitty is not missing any longer. When I was sweeping the other day I really dug under a shelf and pulled out a kitten-sized minion. The fortune kitty was in the middle. Apparently Obi thought his minions needed a little bit of luck to get that life-giving lightning bolt.

 

***

In other news, I found out – after knowing him for 11 years – that The Boy doesn’t like avocados. That means I have four to eat myself this week. Oh, the hardship. Since I couldn’t find the recipe I saw on Pinterest that inspired the purchase of avocados, I decided to make tuna salad tonight. The Boy was leaving so I had to boil my own eggs.

 

Obi walked through the kitchen once and saw me at the big white box. He put his head down and moved on.

***

And now, today’s actual story:

Oliver wanted to get up this morning. More importantly, he wanted me to get up. And Obi agreed. They were doing a full scale push of annoying things – bouncing the bathroom door, crying from the toothbrush stand, playing with the blinds, poking me in the nose. At one point I heard my glasses slide of my side table.

Here is where I tell you that I really can’t see without my glasses or contacts. And my glasses are just pink stems and the lenses with no frame. I depend on my fantastic memory to find my glasses in the morning.

So this morning I had to crawl around on my knees to find my missing eyesight. It went a little like this:

Me: Obi, where did you put my glasses?

Oli: FEED ME!

Me: I have to find my glasses.

Oli: FEED ME! I’M DYING!

Me: Oh, come on, where could they have gone?

Oli: FEED ME! SOOOOOOOO HUNGRY!

Me: [Censored because I have a personal policy about cussing online]

The Boy: Are they under the bed?

Me: How should I know? I CAN’T SEE.

The Boy: Right.

Oli: FEED ME!

Obi: I thought we were having breakfast.

Oli: FEEEEED ME!

I did finally find my glasses, an arm length (way further than I can see) under the bed, in a shadow, behind a shoe.

Seriously.

Refills

Oliver is a pudding head. By that I mean that there in nuttin’ but puddin’ up in that cute grey head of his. For some reason, there are things that pudding heads seem to like. Things, I think, that put those brains under pressure so they can think better for a while.

The claw is one of those things. Tamping down on the noggin seems to be very nice.

The other thing? Air. Oliver loves to have air blown into his forehead. We call this giving him a refill. Obviously, pudding full of air is under pressure and makes for clearer thoughts. 

The hot weather, evidently, has allowed all the air to escape from the grey brain. We spent about thirty minutes today trying to fill his head back up. He sat on the armrest of the couch and I pressed my lips to his forehead and blew short bursts of breath. Then I’d run out of air and he would sit up straight and give me happy face. And then the forehead came back toward my lips.

Eventually he left. Refilled.

***

In other events, there’s this tiny 100,000 person festival going on here in town. That’s right, the mighty Cheyenne Frontier Days and all that entails is here. But Obi is not interested in Westerns on OutTV and just rolls his eyes when I tell him “Rodeo Queens Riding to the Parade” is on. He also does not care about “Carriage with Big Horses.”

So many channels and nothing good is on.

Biting the Hand That Feeds You

First, a word about the weather: hot.

Cat-melting hot. As hot as it is, though, we have not moved to the basement to escape it because it is still cooling off at night. The fan is doing its job as long as two cats don’t pile up at the bottom of the bed and block all the air.

***

A couple weeks ago I made a skirt out of a favorite pair of jeans that had a hole in them. Here is where I should point out that if I like something and it is a good deal I buy multiples. My black winter boots are the same style as my brown ones. When my brown flats wore out I went to the store and bought a black pair without looking around. This is a great system…until things start wearing out at the same time.

So this week I was making a skirt out of the second pair of favorite jeans that had a hole in them.

Obi helped. Again.

While I was on the floor with scissors and a brown kitten, I decided to work on the mats developing on Obi’s back. He was not impressed.

He started biting at me. At me. I’ve realized that neither of the kittehs has ever really bitten me. When we play they chew on my hands as I get their bellies but they don’t ever clamp down. And I’ve read that a cat will “love bite,” where they only bite down with one side of their mouth. Obi does that.

When I was working on the mats, Obi bared his teeth and bumped them into my hands. It hurt even less than play biting. He looked at me desperately: please, Girl, stop because this is as mean as I get.

I took pity. The mats remain.

For now.

Tortie Trained, Kitten Approved

I don’t know if I said this before, but I was recently asked to serve on the Cheyenne Animal Shelter board of directors. I am so pleased to do this. Oliver came from the feral cat population on the north side of town; the shelter is working to make it legal for them to trap, spay and release the cats of that population to keep it from growing out of control. I’m a fan of that program. And Obi, of course, came from the shelter.

If you’re newer, here’s how Kitten Thunder came to us.

The most challenging thing about the shelter board, I think, will be the temptation.

This kitten and I had a moment last week, as you can see. Okay, it was more like an hour. As I told her, I was trained by a Tortie and maintain my scritchy skills on two very picky kittens. She also approved. It made me seriously start thinking that maybe what our household needs is another female.

I got over it. For now.

As I keep telling everyone who wants me to get this kitten, or another adorable kitten that needs a home from this weekend, or the charmer I met this afternoon: I have four years on this board and we haven’t even had our first meeting yet. I need to pace myself.

We’re doomed.

Yarn

It was only in the 80s today. Inspired by the cool temperatures, I decided to break out the loom and knit a scarf. It happened in small steps. I got the loom. I got the yarn. I removed the foot of peach scarf that I started, oh, 15 years ago.

There were no cats to be seen.

Finally, I started to knit.

As I wove the first row onto the nails, Obi appeared. He watched. He snuggled. He chewed on yarn as it came free from the roll.

He left as I tried to take his picture.

Oliver arrived. He allowed me to drape completed scarf over him as I worked because he wanted my lap. He also chewed on the yarn on its way to the loom.

He left as I picked up the camera.

My thumb nail hurts. As a kid, I used this loom all day and never had an issue. I think it make be time to grow up and buy a hook. I put the yarn and loom in a big bag for the night and tied it shut.

Why? Because I’m not an idiot.

Both cats have been by to try to get some yarn. They’ve worked at the bag for several minutes each before giving up on the knot. And they’ve fixed me with a glare.

Stupid Girl and her stupid thumbs.

Whineybutt

How long does it take a tall grey kitten to pull a plate of cheesecake off the counter? Not long enough for me to run upstairs to open the windows.

Whose fault is it that he doesn’t like cheesecake? Mine, evidently.

And now, a note from Oliver:

This morning, at around 2 a.m., I figured out the key to world peace. The solution was so simple and it would also solve the world’s hunger problems AND bring back unicorns.

Obviously, I wanted to share this news with the people right away.

I jumped to the toothbrush stand and called my discovery to the ceiling. The Boy rolled over. The Girl did nothing. I went closer because maybe she couldn’t hear me.

Sitting on the floor by the bed, I called out my news again. I could tell she was awake but she still did nothing. She didn’t even open her eyes. I think this is part of what she was telling The Boy about “not offering positive reinforcement” when I have something important to say in the morning. Whatever THAT means. All I know is that she used to show me that she agreed with me by saying “SSSH!” And now she doesn’t.

Since I know she’s not getting stupider, I think she’s just agreeing silently. We’ve transcended words…which is good because her accent is horrible.

I snuggled up to The Girl and she stroked my head. I forgot about my discovery and dozed off for a minute. But then it hit me! Breakfast! Of course the people would be more interested in this type of conversation over a meal.

I sprang to my feet and invited The Girl to feed me. Awake, but unresponsive. So I poked her in the nose. About twenty times. Nothing.

I stomped over her and onto The Boy. He grunted. Then nothing. And The Girl did nothing. This is weird because The Girl is really protective of The Boy – he is, after all, one of her pack. She takes good care of all of us. And he’s hopeless compared to Obi and me.

After a long effort, trying to get the people up to hear my ideas, I was exhausted and succumbed to sleep.

The breakfast bell went off. I told The Girl, as we went downstairs, that I had a brilliant idea. She called me a whineybutt. So did The Boy. I assume this is a term for geniuses or pioneers.

After breakfast I met The Girl on the couch for post-breakfast snuggle. At last, I would be able to tell her my idea.

But I forgot.

Rug…Rats

It has been several weeks since we got a new rug. Obi does not approve. At least, that’s what I’m supposed to think. The Boy, though, tells me otherwise.

When I’m not in the room, Obi will get his belly rubbed on the rug. If I am on the couch he will not. He’ll go to the rug and let The Boy pet him or brush him. And he’ll wander around looking lost.

This evening we proved that it is me that he’s trying to impress with his dissatisfaction. Best Kitteh Sitter in the World, Lori, came over for some quality porch time. While I was in the kitchen getting a beer, Lori greeted the kittehs. She rubbed Obi’s belly. On the rug as she has been trained to do.

I walked in.

The brown kitten jumped up.

Brush me, he said. But the damage was done. I had seen the belly. The rubbing. The joy.

***

Kitten Thunder is still enjoying their pile of tissue paper. Today it caused a battle. A battle of laser kitty proportion.

Who won? They both did. When they decided to climb into the gift bag instead.

Attitude

Obi’s tail has a mind of its own. When he naps he has to hold it down. If it escapes his grasp it flicks here and there and here again – it will disturb the brown kitten’s nap so much that he’ll have to get up. Unless the tail has another target.

 

This evening the tail escaped while Obi was napping on the back of the recliner. Normally this would have been a problem for him. Luckily, for him, The Boy was sitting in the chair. The tail was distracted by The Boy – flicking against his ear, jabbing him in the eye, wrapping up under his nose.

Obi napped on.